On-line network chat, or real-time computer chat, is well known and typically involves communication amongst two or more client computers across a computer network via a conference, or chat room. When a chat session is established in chat room, messages sent from a client computer that is party to the chat session are sent to all other clients that are party to the session. The distribution of messages amongst the participating clients takes place substantially in real-time thereby giving the users of the client computers a sense of real-time communication with others.
Well known in the art is the ability to store a chat history, or a record of all client communications during a particular chat, that has taken place during a particular chat session to a storage medium. Often, however, chats about a single subject can take place over multiple chat sessions. In these situations, the chat history from a previous chat would be useful to retain context for the current chat session. Current solutions, however, do not recognize the continuation of a chat session and do not allow retrieval of a chat history for use in a current chat session.